From December 26 to January 10, the Otago Daily Times held the annual Magic Moments competition, which drew numerous entries.
First place went to Fairfield resident Nevin Davie, who took the winning picture of his son, Leon Davie, playing with his gift on December 29.
Mr Davie had popped out on to his balcony with Leon to watch him play with his new toy and thought it would be a sweet moment to capture.
"Leon was running back and forth, and I was running back and forth the other way taking a load of photos — it is very hard to set anything up with a toddler while they run around playing."
Most of the pictures came out blurry but Mr Davie did end up with a great picture of his son "looking pretty happy".
Leon was still obsessed with his bubble gun and Mr Davie said it had the added benefit of giving their balcony a wash.
"Bubbles do something wonderful for cleaning the balcony, so it’s quite good ... Leon was trying to use it to clean the bird poo off the window earlier, but it didn’t do a great job of that."
Mr Taylor was with his support worker when the two decided they should take their cameras to the beach.
"There were about five or six sea lions and they kept falling asleep and then waking up and fighting ... again and again."
The pair waited about two hours when Mr Taylor finally took the perfect picture.
"I was ready for it ... but it definitely took time."
He said he was a big fan of wildlife photography, and also enjoyed taking pictures of passing cruise ships in the harbour and planes coming into the airport.
